


Projector

by Sera_Clay



Category: The Blacklist (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-14
Updated: 2014-12-14
Packaged: 2018-03-01 11:53:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2772011
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sera_Clay/pseuds/Sera_Clay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lizzington one shot, angsty</p>
            </blockquote>





	Projector

Professor Elizabeth Keen has just completed her slide show for her Quantico class of new FBI recruits on the subject of gesture within criminal relationships, designed to guide new agents engaged in surveillance in understanding.

Many of her slides date back ten years to her first assignment with the bureau, when she worked closely with a criminal mastermind named Raymond "Red" Reddington, currently at large, whereabouts unknown. For today's lesson, Liz has shown the class a wide range of embraces, variously signifying alliances, dominance, simple charm, and even murderous intent.

At the end of the lecture she assigns each student to pull archive files and locate additional examples from closed cases showing other international criminals with their known associates, displaying and analyzing their use of the gesture. It's a lot of work for one class assignment; she's known to be tough but fair.

Liz flips off the projector, shuts her laptop and turns on the stage lights, leaving the half-circle swathe of auditorium seating filled with students in the dim glow that was just sufficient for them to take notes.

Then she calls, as always, for questions.

"Professor Keen?"

Th student who stands is one of her secret favorites, cadaverously thin, with short, jet black hair and a passion for profiling that perhaps exceeds her own. 

"Yes?"

"How did Raymond Reddington embrace you when you met?" he asks, notebook at the ready. "For example, when he met you in Moscow six years ago, to give you the data on the Vice-President's assassination?"

Liz shakes her head, just once.

"He did not embrace me in greeting" she responds, specific, to the point.

The student remains standing.

"And why was that, Professor Keen?" he asks, head cocked to one side. She can see that he is genuinely curious, feels the tension rise in the room as the hands of the clock on the wall behind her tick over. One minute to the end of the class.

Liz shakes her head, once, twice, answering the question without a filter as the image of Red in his cashmere overcoat, standing on the Zverev Bridge as she walks toward him fills her memory. He has his hands in his pockets, she could see that distinctly. But why?

"Raymond Reddington always knows why he's embracing people - that's one of the ways he communicates."

She pauses, letting the question settle into the back of her mind, letting her trained intuition rise to the surface.

"He doesn't embrace people when he's unsure of the relationship."

That's it, but not all of it.

"He wants, he needs to be ... in control. The embrace is one of the ways he asserts that control."

And that's not quite it, again.

A buzzer sounds, signaling the end of the class, and she raises her voice to thank the student, who is already stuffing his notebook into his briefcase, undoubtedly anxious to get to lunch.

Liz stands at the lectern as the lecture hall empties, stands in the circle of light cast by the stage lights.

She stands alone remembering how she walked up to Red that last time, with her own hands in her pockets. How his overcoat seemed to pull tight across his chest, as if he were pushing his fists hard down into the bottom of his coat pockets.

His smile had been so bland that day, his hat tipped so low over his eyes.

They had looked at each other for a moment, then began walking side by side, talking quickly in low tones.

*He's still waiting for me.*

It was like a voice-over in a film, an insight so shocking Liz just stands as if poised on the edge of high building, only a breath of wind from falling. Then she reaches out to grab the lectern to keep her balance.

In her mind a different image loops, an alternate future in which she pulled her hands out of her pockets as she stepped out onto Zverev Bridge. In which she stood waiting in front of him until he did the same, looking down at her, that bland gaze turning bright and expectant. In which she stepped close to embrace him, pressing against him with the whole length of her body. Her arms curving around to hold him. His arms pulling her even tighter. His cold face against her hair.

Professor Elizabeth Keen stands silently weeping in an empty classroom, her arms wrapped around herself, trying to hold back ten years of sobs.


End file.
